Anthony Albertazzi, Mike Seidel, Laurel Cherkoss and Matt Mohill This Oregon lawyer lied to me.

  Albertazzi Law Firm

 1070 NW BOND STREET

        bend

        oregon

       97702

Per Michael Seltzer

Contact_WorkPhone:                        541 948 3662

Contact_Email:                            choppersrcool@msn.com

facts:

THIS IS IN ADDITION TO THE COMPLAINT I FILED EARLIER.

On Wed. of this week I went to the  court house  to review my own file, the case between the plaintiff and myself ( the defendant).  The date on Wed was the 29th of April and in that case file I read a decision stating that ? Mr. Mohill's motion had been denied.  This motion was an ammendment of an original motion that I have not read.  Why it had to be ammended is still a question I have yet to be answered.

So I called Mr. Mohill, Mathew Mohill, my attorney who works for Albertazzi law firm in Bend, Oregon and asked him what this denial means?  He seemed to be unaware of it of I caught him off guard, but I told him that I had read in the file, a DENIAL from judge, Judge Brady .  Matt told me to stop going to the court house to read my case file and to ask him questions.

So I  asked him if this motion was in  OUR favor and his response was that it was in fact in our favor.  In speaking to a clerk today at the court house, since my attorney is not  responding to me, nor has returned my call from Wednesday , the clerks response was that this DENIAL motion was NOT in my favor.   Matt Mohill told me that it was in our favor and to not read the case file.   The Plaintiff makes an argument that my attorney missed a deadline and did not meet the courts rules, which I am left to assume is the reason our motion was denied. 

On top of this IT seems that I am now paying an attorney to miss deadlines, is not on top of his case and it is a way to blatantly rack up hours on my bill, which has far been exceeded as per our original agreement made verbally by both Mike Seidel and Laurel Cherkoss, but who started my case, but then passed on the case to Mr. Mohill as in me having to repeat my case and meet on three seperate occasions to start over explaining the circumstances of the case.

It is Friday afternoon and I have still not heard back from my attorney.  

I was lied to by my attorney and I am now stuck with a case I am unable to render on my own and in addition I am stuck with not having any other options as I have given my attorney all of the money I had to spend on this Frivilous suit.

It amazes me that a seemingly crazy person in prison can beat a law firm and can get a denial on this case based on a simple technical deadline.

Please consider this a FORMAL complaint please.
 

Contact_FullName:                         Per Michael Seltzer

Contact_WorkPhone:                        541 948 3662

Contact_Email:                            choppersrcool@msn.com

types:                                    This Oregon lawyer has overbilled

me for hours.

Who is this Oregon lawyer?_FullName:      Anthony Albertazzi, Mike Seidel,

Laurel Cherkoss and Matt Mohill

Who is this Oregon lawyer?_Organization:  Albertazzi Law Firm Who is this Oregon lawyer?_StreetAddress: 1070 NW BOND STREET

Who is this Oregon lawyer?_Address2:     

Who is this Oregon lawyer?_City:          Bend

Who is this Oregon lawyer?_State:         Oregon

Who is this Oregon lawyer?_ZipCode:       97702

facts:

This complaint is against Anthony Albertazzi Law firm in Bend, Oregon

Your list above did not allow me to highlight all of the relevant issues of this complaint.

This is a little long winded so bear with me please.  A convict who is in prison who USED to be a friend of mine filed a civil action against me from prison in October 2008.  I have known his parents and his brother and he for some 22 years.  I though I would be able to help him out when he last got out of prison to readjust to a free life.   Long story short, he broke into my neighbors home and got arrested on burglary charges and was sent back to prison.  I was angry and sent him a letter stating that he was a piece of crap.

 Anyways once I had been served with papers being sued for 6 million dollars I went to a friend, Mike Seidel at Albertazzi law firm in Bend, Oregon.   

I was very clear to Mike that I was struggling and asked him for his advice on how to handle this case.   I was crystal clear with him over the fact that I had not worked for months due to the economy and asked if it would be better to let him get his default judgment as in me doing nothing and then filing for bankruptcy as it is likely to happen anyways due to finances are getting worst by the day.  He explained to me that he thought that this case could be won and thrown out and with a chance of the Judge leaning in my favor to have the plaintiff pay the legal costs.   I was informed at the time that I would have to pay them, albertazzi law firm a sum of $2500 and that this should cover the case completely and with the provision that we pray for the judge to be  siding in our favor.   The plaintiff in this case is an Oregon Inmate at OSCI.   The plaintiff was able to file this for FREE on the basis that he filed for an affidavit of indigence.   I have proven thru the parents of the plaintiff that he committed "false swearing" on his affidavit as he failed to mention on the affidavit that his father is holding money for him in trust and the affidavit asks for all finances to be released.   This is a separate issue.

I borrowed the money from my mother to pay the 2500 as I am again not and have not had any income for almost 9 months  at the time of writing this.

Mike Seidel told me he would start on the case and then I was redirected to a second attorney, so I was put in a position to have to go thru the case all over again to cover all of the details of the case.  The lawyer I was passed onto was Ms. Laurel Cherkoss.  In January of this year I met with her and she was working on finalizing the "summary judgment " as plaintiff had not produced any proof of this claims and it was explained to me that the summary judgment was to ask the courts, asking the Judge, Judge Brady to throw it out due to lack of any proof and being that it was a frivolous case in its very nature.    This took place in January of 2009 and my bill was for at that time about half of the 2500 dollars.   She assured me that it would not be much more than that at the time  and I again explained to her that I was not able to pay more unless the judge would rule in our favor. 

At the end of January I was sent a letter from the law firm of Anthony Albertazzi stating that Laurel Cherkoss had left the firm and had left due to serious medical reasons and informed that I would have a new attorney Mr. Matt Mohill.   Now for the third time I had to go in and tell my story and go thru the case detail by detail and go thru the case file as it appeared that he knew nothing about the case and that he now was going to have to start afresh with me , learn the details and go thru the case to make sure he was in full understanding of the details of the case.     Matt informed me that he would put together a summary judgment and get it off as Laurel Cherkoss had explained to me she was in the process of compiling.  Some time had gone by and it seems that Mr. Mohill had been thrown into Laurel Cherkoss's case load and I am in no way attacking his competence.  However why is it now that I am and have been charged to date over 6 000 SIX THOUSAND Dollars and having been shuffled from one attorney to the other.   I was at no point offered to be reimbursed my money in the change of attorney and given no heads up or information stating that I would be charged triple for this case.  It is absurd and my fee agreement was based on a verbal agreement with Mike Seidel in that I did not have more than 2500 dollars to put into this case.   At no time did I or was I told or informed that they thought it would be more than that, as otherwise I would have "shopped" for an attorney who could give me a second quote.   I am worried as I signed a fee agreement, but in this agreement there was nothing about me being charged for the work of three separate attorneys and me being billed THREE Times.   It should be the cost of the law firm to "eat" those hours and not bill me for that time as I am not in control of diseases and illnesses.   Nor am I in control of how someone chooses to run their law firm.   But they have to  be ethical in their practices and had a duty to inform me of this case running over the 2500 as I ha 

Yesterday I went to the courthouse  April 29th to read the case file myself as my attorney had not been in touch with me to fill me in on a decision that was made on April 21st which I understood to mean that Mr. Mohills , my attorneys summary judgement had been denied, but he cleared it up with me when I called him.   It was at this time he informed me that I owed his lawfirm another 3500 dollars.  I informed him of the fact that I had been very clear with Mike Seidel and Laurel Cherkoss the exact position I was in and that I am not able to pay more than what I gave them up front.    Mr. Albertazzi has failed to contact me on one occasion where I left him a message.      I was told by Matt Mohill when I spoke to him yesterday that I did not have the money and his comment to me was " I have worked hard on this case"  I received no explanation as to why the summary judgment had not been done in January and why I had now been thru three different attorneys on this case.    I told him the only way that they would get paid NOW is if the judge rules in our favor.   My stance is that I have been overbilled and it has been done blatantly as if I am a pawn in a game I do not understand.  Further the idea that I should have had an attorney present to review the fee agreement after what was orally said to me is absurd.   Attorneys are to protect their clients and to legally advise them and do so with honor and integrity and to stay in communication with their clients.

This brings me to the last part of this and that is that the law firm has appeared to be disorganized and not able to communicate with me.   In reading my case file at the court house yesterday it was stated by the plaintiff that my attorney did not file it correctly and did not mean a certain time line.  I am unsure as to the exact meaning of this, but last time I was in Mr. Mohills office I was called and he informed me that they, as in the law firm needed me to drop off a fee of 50 FIFTY Dollars for the filing of the Summary Judgment.  I dropped it off the very next day and two weeks later I get a call from Mr. Mohill asking me why I had not dropped off the fee.  Surely this could have been a clerical or miscommunication, but is shows that my case is not a priority and that I am the last person being communicated with.   I have to ask also why a court document in my file dated April 21st, 2009 was not communicated with me and why it took my attorney for me to call him to ask him about the case?  Further at the time of me being in his office to sign my affidavit which was signed by me and notarized why it was not informed to me at that time that I had in fact been billed a total of 3500 in addition to  my 2500 dollar retainer?

It is today Thursday evening and I am sending this to you as I am frustrated, feel like I have been essentially tricked or mislead and been billed for the work of three different attorneys.  I was also told I would get a call from Mr. Matt Mohill today which never took place so I am again left to guess what is going on in my case and I guess I expected a lot more professionalism, honesty and ethical communications.   Mr. Mohill is the one who had taken this case the furthest, but why am I again paying for THREE attorneys and where is the willingness of the law firm to do the right thing?     If Mr. Albertazzi is not aware of how his firm is run, then it may be suggested he follow his staff a bit more and make sure that the client, me in this case are taken care of.  

This situation is no different than three mechanics removing and replacing a motor in a car.  But to charge the client for the work of three mechanics as in that each mechanic has to take the motor all the way out because he or she was not sure how far the prior mechanic got with the install of this motor and then expecting the client to gladly pay for it would be absurd.

I am not an attorney, but it appears that a deadline was missed as now the plaintiff is making an argument as to that it was missed by one day and that this is now going to cost me another round of this taking place.  Again I may be wrong, but the lack of communication with my attorney was and has not been present, nor the communication from Mr. Albertazzi as it is his firm and his reputation which this bears on.     The fact Mr. Albertazzi has not returned my calls is very puzzling as if he does not have the time to confer with his firms clients.

I had not  opened up by bills from the firm due to that I was assured twice that this case would not exceed 2500 and that I would be informed if that was the case by phone or by person to person meeting.   This has not taken place.  And again I am sitting her over 24 hours from the time I spoke with Mr. Mohill and am again left hanging to assume or wait for communication.

I wish this complaint to stay on file until I get some resolve in this case.  

The only way the attorneys and I can get repaid for any of the legal fees to date is if the judge rules in our favor as the plaintiff has a trust set up by his parents in their name which they have agreed to pay if I get a judgment in this case.

Before I forget, I presented a letter to Albertazzi law firm from the plaintiffs father informing "to whom it may concern" that in fact the plaintiff is sitting on a trust of 9000 NINE thousand dollars and I was told this letter would be presented to the judge and to the plaintiff along with the summary judgment which it was not according to the case file I myself looked at , at the courthouse.  Again I am not an attorney, but it could be easily interpreted by the judge that in fact the affidavit if indigence filed by the plaintiff to be honest and truthful, which it was not and that the judge may not side with my legal fees being paid due to the plaintiff being in prison and assumed to have no outside funds to pay my legal costs.

The Marion County DA's office can charge the plaintiff with "False swearing" based on the fact the plaintiff signed the affidavit stating he has NO monies in TRUSTS, which was confirmed as a lie by his father and I pressed charges with the Deschutes County Sheriffs office when I was "served" by the process server as I went in and looked at the case file at that time and due to the nature of my work reading legal documents and signed contracts I knew the affidavit was untruthful.   I feel this is a valuable fact as it shows the plaintiff is willing to lie no matter what the cost as that is what this case is based on....LIES and more LIES.  The case is of a frivolous nature.

Due to having not heard from my attorney, me having read the case file yesterday at the court house and a decision having been dated over ten days ago when I read this, shows I am not being represented as I had been led to believe.

Being I am  not an attorney I had no other option than to file this complaint with you as my law firm is and has shown their inability to communicate with me.   And I have no reason to trust them at this point as everything is in the dark.     I have some serious concerns at this point. I question now if the judge rules in my favor that the plaintiff will not be instructed by the courts to pay money out of his trust, held by his father as it was NOT presented to the judge.  It would seem to be a judge would not rule to have an indigent person pay if there was no way for this person to pay, being that this piece was left out and not presented, after Mr. Mohill told me that it would be presented to the courts along with my affidavit and the summary judgment he prepared. 

I wish to have this complaint filed immediately as I am unsure as to how and what my rights are at this point.   I will not wish to remove it until I have some resolution and will do so in writing.   At this point I fear I may be held hostage over the fact that this case has not been completed and I am now going to be dumped or have this case fumbled on purpose as a retaliation method of this law firm.   I am not sure what to think or believe other than what I have stated in this letter.

Please feel free to contact me at 541 948 3662  

I thank you for your time and kind consideration.  I apologize if this statement is redundant, but I did not want to miss a single detail as I am now living in fear with this as I am not communicated with.  

Please NOTE that I am putting Ms. Laurel Cherkoss in this complaint, but I wish to express to you that if she left the law firm due to illness then I have no issues with her as she in January was preparing the summary judgment and was going to file it a week after I met with her, or within a week as she communicated with me.  She also communicated with me via email and was prompt returning my calls and seemed to be on top of this case.  It is now May 1st.